Now considered in some quarters to be a masterpiece and one of his finest films, John Ford's final film "7 Women" was neither a critical nor a commercial success at the time, (though the magazine Cahiers Du Cinema did name it as one of the ten best films of the year). The 7 women of the title are missionaries in 1935 China; at least six of them are, the seventh, played by Anne Bancroft, is the new doctor who joins them. The only man, outside of a few Chinese servants, is teacher Eddie Albert, that is until warlord Mike Mazurki comes calling with rape and pillage on his mind.
In many respects this is just another Ford western albeit with a Far Eastern setting and a very fine one it is if not quite the masterpiece some people think it is. For Ford it's also quite explicit in its attitude to sex particularly in its barely hidden lesbian subplot with head missionary Margaret Leighton lusting after young teacher Sue Lyon, seemingly unable to live down "Lolita". Bancroft, when she arrives, isn't just a breath of fresh air but a smoking, swearing, sexually liberated outsider who proves to be more than a match for the invaders.
Like "The Man who Shot Liberty Valance" it's clearly shot on sound stages and like that earlier classic is redeemed by an old man's experience of the world at large as well as an ambivalent attitude towards organized religion with each of the characters beautifully sketched and played. Add plague to the proceedings and you have one of Ford's most unlikely films but one as deserving of our attention as any that preceded it.
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